Precalculus

Enter the 7th year of Liger, my math class also advanced to the next level of math, Precalculus. This subject is very hard and fascinating for me. First of all the idea of studying precalculus has always floated my mine since I am an aspiring engineer but it is very hard to fully grasp every lessons and rule in this subject. Many of the formulae had a pattern and it will be easier to solve if you can understand the rule apply to it. For example, the rule for Slant asymptotes(a line which a graph will infinity or negative infinity if it gets near the value): Slant asymptotes look like this,

This graph comes from the division of x^2 + x + 1 and x+1. In the lesson that I have learned stated that if the equation has a greater power in the numerator then there is a possibility that there is a slant asymptote. To find the asymptote you just need to divide the equation until you cannot go any further. Then ignore the remainder if there is any and what you can divide is the line of the slant asymptote. In this case, y=x is the asymptotes because we can only divide x out of x^2+x+1 with a remainder of 1.

Pre-SAT

What a drag! I have to take the SAT, Scholastic Aptitude Test. This international test consists of many varieties of concepts from math and English. The most important goal in taking this test is to show colleges that I am worthy of their scholarship.

One month effort had been put into this test although not many hours every week are spent on it. I have learned many things during the preparation but most importantly, this test is not to measure your abilities rather how good is your test-taking skill.

I have learned many strategies such as quick pattern realization, skip lengthy questions, and fast problem-solving techniques on different topics. I also expand many topics that I review in class but surprisingly more tactics are becoming handier when facing actual SAT questions during practice.

What I cover in class with facilitators and friends far exceed what has mentioned on this texts today. But I just want to express the gratitude toward my math teacher who had taught me so much technique. One that really interests me is pattern realization, it is as said that SAT question often repeat the same concept or the way they ask questions.

Example: The recommended daily calcium intake for a 20-year-old is 1,000 milligrams (mg). One cup of milk contains 299 mg of calcium and one cup of juice contains 261 mg of calcium. Which of the following inequalities represents the possible number of cups of milk m and cups of juice j a 20-year-old could drink in a day to meet or exceed the recommended daily calcium intake from these drinks alone?

This type of question does come often with different context but they’re the same concept, turn the word problems into an equation. Once you noticed it, transform it into an equation won’t be hard and take a long time because the reading itself give sufficient clue to how the equation should form.

Many more methods are put into play I hope to get the best possible result for my future.

Literacy

Such beautiful day, nothing can be compared to learning something new. This time there is a new facilitator and new lesson she prepared. Cara, the new facilitator, teaches me and my classmates many new subject and technique all through a project to write about the rite of passage. This project back to the past of how did I obtain maturity. This is a piece of my life that I’ll never forget because it is how I am me today. If you want to know more about me read the story below.

 

Comming of Age 

“The difference in strength, what about it? You think I should give up just because you are stronger than me.” The words of Ichigo Kurosaki have changed my life forever. Throughout life I faced many difficulties but without them my life has no meaning. When I figured out ways to overcome those problems, that is when my life story gets more interesting. When I am down sometimes, I felt weak, I felt useless, I felt the urge to give up, but my goal was too precious that kept me from giving in to those challenges. I have always been weak to handle struggles that everybody else would avoid, but doing so made me stronger, it made my life worth living as who I am today. Just like when I was six at the Siem Reap province, grandfather said, “I never give up on my immense dream, so along the way to reach it, I find something or someone to motivate me along the way.” So I pick up his word and pave my own path to succession, by working hard anybody can make the impossible possible.

 

When I was three, a fight broke out between me and my cousin over the precious jewel given to me by my grandmother. I could not defeat my cousin because he was more muscular, and taller, but this time I have to otherwise everything I own will belong to him. I took the beating as usual but something is off, there are voices kept telling me to get up, to stand up and return my cousin a favor. That is when everything went black, I no longer give conscious to kindness, love, weakness, pain, or suffering. In my core is only kill-time, “I gotta fight him, I’ll make him suffer, I will bring him to the ground” voices whispered in my mind. My vision got blurr but I could make out a fist coming for my eye, suddenly everything became slower almost as if time stop. Yet I could feel the wind gushing from his slow strike, instead of dodging the punch I kicked his leg instantaneously he was on the ground crying in pain. I did not stop there, never once in that fight felt a thing only darkness, the only thing in mind is “the killer instinct”. I rush toward him surprisingly I was on top of his stomach, I smash his face without a thought of what I had done. My grandfather, my neighbor, and my uncle thought it was fine, the kid is just playing around, but after they see what’s left on my cousin’s face they came to stop me. But the beast inside of me is raging one person wasn’t enough to stop my wrath, I kept my fist tight and keep throwing jab. It took three people to stop me when they did I nearly faint of all the blood. It’s like a demon possessed me in the fight blocking my emotion. When I look back of what I had done, part of me felt regrets, part of me felt tired, but part of me felt satisfied with the result. He was lying on the ground with blood all over his face, mainly from his broken nose. Even though I am weak but when I go on a rampage, I can surpass anything even those ten time stronger than me. Strength comes from the will to continue fighting even all seem lost, it is the courage to face your fear that create your inner strength.

 

In my past, difficulties led me to one great mystery of my life “purpose”. Only then that I have the guts to tell everyone my name “I am Seyha”. One obstacle in my life made me realize I had potential beyond normal. It was when I enter Khmer primary school in my late 6 years old. When I realize how far behind I was in my studies, I sunk like a rock thrown deep into the ocean. I was always tailing of others until my grandfather enlightens me with beautiful word of motivation. I studied day and night and tried to overcome any lack of understanding of the material. I even created a more efficient way to study. Unlike my older cousin who was tempting to play the game and I do all his work include mine as well, this gives me the opportunity to understand even further about the lesson in school. Even if I was not the best student in the class, but I studied so hard and surpass everyone one by one.

 

“If miracle happens, it only happens once, then what are they called the second time?” pointed out Ichigo Kurosaki. The studying and training paid off, and in the fourth grade, I received a huge opportunity. As teacher Darath and other teachers from the Liger Leadership academy walked in, I saw a gleam of light shining on him, he was like a god who comes to give me a push toward a successful future. When he and other teachers walked in, the first thing he said was, “Any of you who are 10 or younger please come up to me as I explain everyone what are we here for.” When I heard his words my thought was clear, let’s go up and follow him because he looked like a bright guy. But I found myself unable to move because of the hesitation that I bear, what if they want to kidnap children? Or what if they want my kidney? After he explained everything, I feel a little more comfortable and relax, that is when I first approached him. First he led everyone of us to read the Khmer alphabets and vowels, only five of my classmates got pass all the alphabets and vowels. Then there are tests on different subjects (math, literacy, science, and social study), I was the first to finish the tests, so Navin, staff of Liger Leadership Academy, interviewed me about my past and present life. Even though I was rushing and did not answer every questions, I was still the highest scorer of all the testers. That is the first miracle that happen to me is the opportunity to get to me to somewhere and I can speed up my life’s studies. After everyone finished, Liger announced that they will tell the school director when the second test held and the 4 students that passed the test will take the test on that day. Two days passed and Liger returned to the school but the I was not there. I was at home helping my uncle to fix the electrical system in the household. It was really a sudden shock to find a van stopped in front of my uncle’s house. The first person comes to sight was my three best friend walked out of the van guiding Mary (the academy’s social worker) into my house. I was really surprised to see their love and emotion for me.

Those divine words kept me fight to find the meaning of my life. There are many struggles that prevented me from reach my dream but those words made my will stronger than anything I could account for. Everyday I am living life with only one purpose to find the meaning of life lie beyond my reach and fight through all those difficulties that is preventing me. As long as I have my friend next to me, I have all the support I need to goes through hard work and difficulties. Life is not easy as people say, but if you think about it an easy life is a lame story to tell, everyone should find their place in an adventure to live a good life.

Khmer

I can’t wait to go back home and enjoy the holiday of the pchum ban. Tradition holiday of Cambodia where every family member comes together to pray for our ancestor to rise to heaven. Traditionally it is a ceremony to ensure the wellbeing of our ancestor souls. Before I go back to Kandal on September 16, 2017, facilitator Sokha would like to understand the past of the ritual. My team consist of 6 people unravel the past and the ritual pattern changes in the ceremony. Which we then clustered it down into a report on the history of the Pchum ban itself. Click on the link below to view the writing (WARNING: The text is written in Khmer).

Image result for pchum ben

Physic

On 19 October 2017, we did an experiment to drive deeper into force of the object. Forces is an important part of physic because it helps us understand the phenomenon happen every day. There are four main forces; strong force(Sf), electromagnetic force (EM), weak force(W), gravitational force(g). All this force happen on a small scale so it hard to really study about them. It is simpler to cover it up with new names. Like when you push a block of wood down a ramp your hand EM push the wood block Em and your foot push the ground EM, this type of force called applied force in short. We did an experiment on the roughness of the ramp vs what angle paperclip box slide from the top. In physic, even the roughness of object is defined in number in order to solve for friction. Reversely this experiment is to use the angle of friction to find the roughness of the object.

Image result for incline plane

AP stat prep

Currently, I am involved in advanced statistic class, which undergo intense practice and preparation for the Ap test. The AP test is hard and stressful that’s why we need to prepare for it. In this statistic class is probably my most challenging class all year because it is consist of many subjects and hard vocabularies to understand the context. So far I have learned about univariable and bivariable data, also the different way to place the different type of data into form and organize for easy interpret the data. That includes scatterplot, bar graph, box plot, histogram and many other. Currently, I am studying about the line of predicted data and the real data. If you have data on something you can predict a new outcome from the line. For example height and weight, predict height based on weight, if you are 80 kg the graph shows that your height would be around 180cm.

Elephant Knowledge

 

Elephants

 

Introduction

The elephant is the largest land animal in the world.In the past they went to wars and helped the warrior to fight with the enemy .The elephants are strong and big but they are gentle.The elephant are herbivores. The elephant are important for the environment and ecosystem.

History

In the past every king had to find at least one white elephant to improve his power . The of khmer empire the king use the elephant as their army and when their the big fight the elephant will go to fight with.For the normal fight the only one elephant will go with the commander.In the mid 11 century, king soriyak varman 2 buiding the angkor wat he use the elephant to pull the stone from kulen mountian and it easy for working with the elephant. In 12 century, king jayavarman 7 use it to build bayon he use it following king soriyak varman 2.

Ecosystem

The elephants are the key stone species. They help keep the biodiversity  They were helping ecosystem by eating plants. They create gap in vegetation, They also allow plants to grow.They use their dung to spread seeds.They create pathway for other animal to travel or pass. They fertilizes the seeds giving new plants to grow. Some place the plant were die like savannah. If savannah doesn’t have elephant the plant die ,because no one eating big trees to control that from grow tall. Tree will block the sunlight that sending the photosynthesis to plant and the plant die.The antelope & grazer will disappear.The carnivores depend on the Antelope & grazers for food.If the antelope & grazer disappear they will very hungry and die. In the dry season the water is deep under the ground.The elephant use their tusks to dig a water hole for them and another animal to drink.The people did three thing to make the elephant away from their family. They loging the elephant in the circus or zoo.They farming (To farm it use a lot space they cut the forest to farm). They kill the elephant to get tusk for carving a sculpture.

General information

The elephants are the largest land animal in the world .They have two main groups, the african elephant and the asian elephant. The african elephant live in savannah and forest.All the elephant are herbivores they eat grasses, bark, twigs ,leaves ,fruit ,branch , large tree. They spend 18 hour a day to eat. The adult elephant eat 181.4 kg food a day. They drink 113.5-189.2 litres water a day.The trunk and tusks is use to communicating and pick up thing to eat. The female elephant pregnant for 2 years the baby that born can weigh up to 110  kilogram .

Life behaviour

The elephant lives in big herd with all age of the female elephant and young males. The female elephants live in the herd for their whole life , but the male elephant when it between 12 & 17 years old they will leave herd to live alone or in a small herd. The oldest female is called matriarch she is the leader of the elephant herd. She is the only female in the herd that have many experience, she know the geography around the herd and the ways to teach another female , that female will give her knowledge to young male elephant. She kept all the elephant safely together and protect them from getting hunger. She is the one who make all of the important decisions when they met the enemy she tell them when to charge and when to flee in the middle of endanger. She also teaches the female how to take care of their young. The elephant remember their relative forever if they alife. When the elephant is born they alway turn into a circle, flapping their ears and trumpet loudly for the birth. The female elephant has a really strong relationship that why all the elephant alway cellarbrate the birth. They turned injured calf. They kiss or wrap their trunks to show affection. They doesn’t have toy to play but they play game by throwing an object. When they die their relatives bury leaves twigs a year after death their member visit the bones+bmouth.

Physical feature

Trunk:

The trunk is the nose and the upper lip. It help to smell,eat,scratch, greet friend and threaten the enemy. Some time they use it to move or throw something and use it to shower or breathing when they swimming. The truck is 40,000 muscles but no bone and it talk and show feeling by that.

Mouth

The elephant back teeth is the size of the bricks. If you saw the elephant you will said that it has no teeth but if the elephant open their mouth you will see it.

Tusks:

The tusks are the overgrown teeth. another way they use it to carry and pull bark of the tree clear pathways dig the for the roots, water. They also use it to fight against the enemies and to impress the other animal. It can growth to 3 metre long.

Ears:

They fan the ears to cool down.The huge ears can hear far away,shoo the insect from biting the skin. They could show their feeling by that huge ear too!. It make them look bigger when they facing their enemies.

Skin:

The skin getting the sun burnt everyday and it suffer for insect to bites to protect their skin they rolling in the mud and make a dust shower.The water trapped in wrinkles to cool down.

Feet

Their feet have thick padding. The padding softens elephants heavy tread.

Comparing species

African elephants

This elephant is 3.04m tall for both male and female.The male weight up to 5981 kg. The ears cover shoulders. The flat back with a dip in the middle.They have long tusks on both males & females.The skin is more wrinkled and brownish – grey.The flat crown of head with on dent in the middle.

Asian elephants

This elephant can be 2.4m-3.04m tall.The male can weigh up to 4989 kg. The large       ear don’t reach shoulders.They have rounded back. It is shorter Tusks only found on some male.The skin is less wrinkled grey – brown, with pink dot.

The crown of head has a dome shape with dent in the middle.